MitchellWentzell

Snapping Turtle

Modern Day #Dinosaur - A massive snapping turtle walks along the bottom of a Nova Scotia lake. This guy is probably 50-100 yrs old and weighs about 40-50 lbs. S...
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Modern Day #Dinosaur - A massive snapping turtle walks along the bottom of a Nova Scotia lake. This guy is probably 50-100 yrs old and weighs about 40-50 lbs. See my photo story for a size comparison of my hand to his tail. The base of his tail was as thick as my wrist and his head was bigger than my fist. As tough as this #prehistoric #reptile looks and as bad a reputation they have, they are not aggressive in the open water where they feel much more at home. This guy was not bothered with me snorkelling with him once we got used to each other. He was actually more comfortable than I was and on our first meeting. In fact, he placed his nose right on my GoPro. When he started to circle around me, the bottom of the lake got very stirred up. I could barely see him. Yes, that’s when I bolted. I might have even ran on top of the water back to shore. Seriously though these guys are struggling, their numbers are dropping and need our help. They don’t even start breeding until they are almost 20 yrs old. Very few even make it to the water as babies before being eaten by something, even if they do make it, it takes another 3 yrs before they reach a size that makes them a little bit safer from predators. It’s even risky just finding a spot to nest, many get killed by cars as they search for a place to lay their eggs. A lot of nest building beaches are also being destroyed.
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